In recent years, wireless electronic devices with built-in cameras have become increasingly popular. These wireless electronic devices include, but are not limited to, smartphones, digital cameras, and the like and allow users to capture images of their interest. A built-in camera generally includes a sensor, an image signal processor (ISP), and a memory.
A camera system may correspond to a mono camera based system or a multi-camera based system. The camera system may operate in useful camera modes, such as a low light mode and a high definition range (HDR) mode to capture images. In addition, different capture configurations are required for different modes, these capture configurations corresponding to exposure settings, focus settings, and international standards organization (ISO) settings. For example, in order to capture a HDR image using the mono camera based system, a mono camera has to be adjusted to different exposure levels, namely, an auto exposure (AE) level, a short exposure (SE) level, or a long exposure (LE) level. Hence, the mono camera has to capture three sets of images with these different exposure levels. The images that are captured at different exposures are then processed to finally render the HDR image. Similarly, for capturing an image in a low light mode using the mono camera, multiple images with different exposures or ISO settings need to be captured.
Thus, the mono camera based system has several limitations when live preview of images is provided in different modes. Some of these limitations are mentioned below.
Since the above camera modes require specific burst capture configurations, for example, the HDR mode requires use of a built-in sensor for exposure bracketed capture, live preview in such special camera modes is not possible in all devices.
In addition, in these modes, the output image always lags with respect to the previewed image. In other words, zero shutter lag (ZSL) is not possible in such devices for special camera modes.
Scene analysis to identify the mode of decision is limited to using the mono camera based systems and varying parameters thereof. Hence, preset or manual decision based capture configurations are used.
The above disadvantages are overcome by using a multi-camera based system including multiple sensor units. However, these multiple sensor units are configured with predefined exposure setting. As these settings are preset, a user cannot change the settings by analyzing a scene to be captured in order to select a better mode to capture good quality images.
Currently, there exists no solution to improve a preview experience in mono/multi camera systems based on scene analysis. Therefore, there is a need for a novel method to select a multi-camera capture configuration based on scene analysis.
The above-mentioned shortcomings, disadvantages, and problems are addressed herein and which will be better understood from the following specification.
The above information is presented as background information only to assist with an understanding of the present disclosure. No determination has been made, and no assertion is made, as to whether any of the above might be applicable as prior art with regard to the present disclosure.